Here’s why the US has no right to interfere in Nicaragua

by JOHN PERRY

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega speaks to supporters during the opening ceremony of a highway overpass in Managua, Nicaragua March 21, 2019. PHOTO/Reuters/Oswaldo Rivas

It’s been almost 200 years since the US declared that it would allow no
more European colonies in the western hemisphere. A 100 years later this
was twisted into a declaration that Latin America is exclusively the
US’s sphere of influence, giving it a self-proclaimed right to interfere
in other countries’ affairs.

The ‘Monroe Doctrine’, as it was known, deservedly fell into disrepute.
But under President Trump it’s been revived. John Bolton, his national
security adviser, announced in April that ‘the Monroe Doctrine is alive
and well’. In May, he went even further: ‘This is our hemisphere!’ he told reporters after the failed coup in Venezuela.

‘Troika of tyranny’

The new version of the doctrine gives it a further twist. Bolton now
claims to stand in defence of ‘democracy, sovereignty, security, and the
rule of law’, aiming to make the Americas ‘free’ from Alaska to Tierra
del Fuego. Of course, he’s the one who decides what ‘free’ means.

It won’t, for example, mean withdrawing support from a Honduran president who won a fraudulent election
a year ago and runs one of the most repressive regimes in Latin
America. Why? Because he is a Trump ally. No, Bolton intends to focus on
what he calls the ‘troika of tyranny’: Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua,
all the subject of sanctions because their heads of state are ‘the three
stooges of socialism’ who look to Russia and China for support rather
than the US.

So Trump has reversed most of the reforms initiated by Obama in US-Cuba
relations, recognised an unelected head of state in Venezuela and
blocked loans from international agencies for poverty-reducing projects
in Nicaragua.

Of the three countries in Bolton’s ‘troika’ the oddest is Nicaragua. It
has a president, Daniel Ortega, who won an election in 2016 recognised
as fair by the Organization of American States; unlike its northern
neighbours it barely contributes to the ‘migrant caravans’ that so annoy
Trump and it effectively inhibits drug smuggling. Until a year ago it
was also the safest country in the region.

Return of the Reaganites

What angers Bolton (and his special envoy Elliott Abrams) is Ortega
himself. Bolton was part of the Reagan administration and helped to find
ways to hide the funding of the ‘Contras’ that were attacking
Nicaragua’s Sandinista government in the 1980s; Abrams was indicted for
his role in covering up that scandal but was later pardoned by Reagan’s
successor, President Bush. For both of them, a resuscitated Monroe
Doctrine is not about freedom, it’s about getting rid of leftist
governments.
Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua are all the subject of sanctions because
their heads of state look to Russia and China for support rather than
the US

He ended the daily power cuts that occurred under his predecessor while doubling the proportion of homes that have electricity. Nicaragua is now one of eleven countries said to be leading the charge on renewable energy, aiming for its electricity supply to be 90 per cent renewable within the next year.

Settling old scores

Rather than pursuing freedom, it’s pretty obvious that Bolton and Abrams are settling historic scores. Ortega bounced back from electoral defeat in 1990, so now he’s denounced as a brutal dictator. Yet the US administration is targeting sanctions not just at Ortega himself but at the programmes funded by the World Bank and other agencies that have been part of his drive to end extreme poverty.

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